Exclusive by Luke Hollands

Staff at Kent County Council took off more than 248 years'
worth of sick leave - in 2009 alone.

Sick workers took an amazing 90,773 working days off last year,
with ailments ranging from gynaecological conditions to skin
problems.

Taking an average eight-hour working day paid at the minimum
wage of £5.80 an hour, this works out as a potential bill of
£4,211,867 if the staff were to be replaced.

Muscle strains, aches and pains were responsible for the loss of
the most days. A total of 30,279 days were lost because of those
conditions.

A combination of stress and mental illness resulted in the
second biggest loss, with 23,681 days taken.

The figures refer to the council's body of 14,765
centrally-controlled staff, which includes those who work in
positions such as council administration, librarians or adult
education staff but not teachers.

The figures were released after a freedom of information request
by KM Group.

A spokesman for Kent County Council said: "In comparison, Kent County Council has had no more sick leave taken than most companies or institutions of a similar size and significantly less time sick than the public sector average, which is 9.7 days per employee.

"Over the last few years we've been working closely with our
managers to improve attendance and to investigate ways in which we
can support all our staff to maintain their health and well-being
at work.

"We have had some significant successes in reducing long-term
sickness and continue to consider this as an area for improvement
although in some cases it is unavoidable.

"The reasons for staff sickness reflect the type and range of
jobs they undertake and are sometimes related to disability. We are
using sick leave data positively to develop how we continue
improving our attendance rates and support our staff. "

A spokesman for the Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents said the biggest cause of the sick days was no surprise: "In most workplaces, musculoskeletal disorders tend to be the biggest cause of work-related sickness absence.

"As with all aspects of accident and ill health prevention at
work, a good risk assessment will get things going. This enables
the major risks to be spotted and prevention strategies to be
developed.

"For musculoskeletal disorders, prevention can include good
posture when working with computers, avoiding particularly
hazardous manual handling and being trained in good manual handling
techniques for other situations, such as when loads are being
lifted, pushed or pulled."

According to statistics released by the Local Government Association (LGA), the body that represents councils across the country, the national average sick leave taken by council staff is 9.6 days a year.

Dividing the number of working days taken by Kent County Council
staff by the number of staff gives an average of six days sick
leave

The LGA's statistics also show stress, depression, anxiety and
mental health are the most common reasons across the board.

From seaweed to apples for the teacher....what our FoI
requests say about us

A glance at Freedom of Information requests sent to Kent
County Council reveals we are a curious bunch.

Hundreds of requests for information have been sent to the
council in past years, and they include some intriguing
questions.

The council has been quizzed about dangerous wild animals, sea
weed, gifts given to teachers, celebrity appearances and
improvements to the Crab and Winkle Way route linking Canterbury
and Whitstable.

The Freedom of Information Act 2000 came in to force after years
of fighting by campaigners to make public bodies more
transparent.

It has since become a useful tool for journalists.

In the past few years KM Group has used the FOI act to reveal
information not readily available to the public.

An 18-month battle with Kent County Council ended with the
Information Commissioner forcing them to reveal sites under
consideration for an M20 lorry park.

Other requests discovered how millions of pounds of public money
was spent on Ashford's shared space and funding for failed online
television channel Kent TV.